Winchester to Hazel, Virginia (Day 2)

We left at around 7:30am, it’s the first time for me to intentionally ride through rain. Weather forecast this morning indicated severe weather and thunderstorms along our route, so we decided to see if the weatherman really knows what he is talking about.

Daily weather check, Motel 6 Winchester, VA

With one cup of coffee in me, we take off into the grey & cloudy horizon. Within in minutes, 45 F temperatures began penetrating my 4 season riding gear at 80mph. Same thing I had to deal with yesterday. Along the right side I caught a glimpse of a family of deer, thought cute for a second, then had to raise my alert level. Light drizzle turned into rain quick, visibility was reduced especially behind those 18-wheelers who impeded visibility in general for all vehicles on the road, but much more it seemed for someone on a motorcycle who was getting sprayed on by water flying out of the 18 tires of the many trucks we had to overtake. This was my first real test of nerves and focus. Nerves to trust my own motorcycle tires on wet roads and praying that I would not skid or slide under a one of these trucks. Focus to hold my line while over taking these trucks when all I could see are blurry objects (vehicles) and the yellow lines to my left and the dotted white lines to my right separating me from these trucks and other cars.Totally out of my element, I had to apply tunnel vision and extreme focus as my body would tense up while over taking these big rigs. Freezing ice cold wind and rain along with overcoming my fear of dying forced me to grip my handlebars so tight I began to lose the sensation on my fingers, so I taught myself some finger exercises, shoulder rotations and practiced a lot of deep breathing (not found on youtube videos) to improve the bodies circulation and maintain muscle coordination. As I tuck in and squeeze the gas tank with my legs, the windy conditions, wet roads, and over taking these long ass trucks at 85-90 mph offered zero tolerance for any mundane thoughts.

After 40 miles Alan decides to exit the highway, while parked in front of Denny’s, he tells me his 4 season gloves just ain’t cutting it, he heads for the restroom to put his numb and light blue colored fingers under the hand dryer.  We didn’t really talk much about that scary ride and just focused on trying to figure out which of the 20 or so bacon inspired breakfast variations on the menu. Every opportunity you get to lift your spirit on a journey like this is truly special and critical no matter what it may be. In this case it was BACON.

Sure enough after this meal, we were recharged and fired up to ride in the rain again.

After a 100 or so miles we pulled into the Holiday Inn Express in Hazel, Virginia. 

It looked like a luxury suite compared to the Motel 6 we stayed in the night before, it was like a reward for surviving the day. 

We unpacked to change into more civilian looking clothes, checked the hotel facilities, and since the sun came out a bit, we decided to test the video cam called the Drift HD Ghost (Go Pros competition) and visit Starbucks. It was nice to ride without all our gear. 

 

We found what we were looking for at Starbucks and noticed that the old monochrome pictures on the wall depicting one of the first Starbucks store had the logo of the Starbucks lady with her breasts exposed, nipples included, another mood lifter making the coffee that much better. 

 

We then check out Walmart to buy additional layers of thermal clothing in hopes that it would prevent the cold from reaching our bones on the road. At this point I felt like I was getting a slight fever and could only hear the bed calling me.

Blue Cheese Burger at Holiday Inn, Hazel, VA